March 24, 2024
We have passed the vernal equinox, and it seems that Mother Nature suddenly woke up, and is trying to make up for the 'Winter That Wasn't' by the temperatures and snow she is throwing at us now. We have had mostly bare ground for a while, then a good dump of about 2 inches of snow that miraculously evaporated once the sun got at it.
March 18
The ice in the pond went out on March 17, but now is firmly back in, to the point I might be tempted if I still had my skates! This is the first spring in the 6 springs we have experienced here, that the pond has re-iced.
March 22
Temperatures have been quite nippy, mornings dawning with lows of -11 to -19C. (12F to -2F), some days the mercury barely getting up out of freezing territory. Of late, we have had an abundance of lovely sunshine, with the solar batteries staying topped up so well, it is time to disinter some electrical appliances from winter storage. During the winter, we watch our power usage carefully and use the wood stove a lot for cooking. Living with solar electricity, one is cognizant of electricity being a finite resource.
Yesterday, a cold but beautiful sunny day, we meandered up the Valley to Petawawa where my sewing machine was in for servicing. We did a short foray into the residential area of Garrison Petawawa. There is a park there on a high promontory overlooking the Ottawa River, with a wonderful view of the islands in the river and the hills along the shore in Quebec. The picture does not do it justice. That is quite a steep hill going down from my vantage point. The park is called Home Fires Park, and is dedicated to the families who keep the home fires going while their loved ones are on deployment.
Back here, on our home front, Hubby has been trying ways to get at a large fallen white spruce tree that had split at it's base when it fell, but firmly wedged itself up on neighbouring trees. It has been taunting him for quite a while.
The tree top is still hung up, as even with pulling it with the tractor, it refuses to budge. There is another good length of usable log in it.
He was able to cut out one log to process. The tree has been hung up there for a while, and the lumber is very dry. This is some seriously beautiful, dry spruce lumber. The boards are just over 13 inches wide.
Although it was quite a mild winter, it has been up and down recently, hasn't it! I think we are going to be in for a melt this week. Let's hope! -Jenn
ReplyDeleteWinter it certainly wasn't! There are lots of signs that the season is progressing though.
DeleteCrikey you can do without a start to spring with white stuff, here in UK, the temperature has dropped again, spring, almost not quite.
ReplyDeleteWe can have snow on into April. A couple of years ago, we were still able to snow-shoe mid-April. This winter has been so un-winterish, and with the snow gone, we sort of expect things to progress 'normally'....but it is early days yet.
DeleteThe lumber is gorgeous. Falling trees getting hung up in others is a worrisome thing. Always a relief to get them on the ground.
ReplyDeleteI think I need a bigger bookcase for my cookbooks! The tree keeled over, over a year ago, so has been hanging out there drying for a while.
DeleteThe view from the gazebo at the Garrison is spectacular! It's darn cold up there with a bit of a breeze though. We have had a lot of windfall this winter. The rain and rapidly rising temperature Tuesday night really took down the little bit of snow in the bush. We went back to the logging area on the ATV the other day. It is BONE dry other than low lying depressions. We expect the big swamp to be dried up once the weather turns to summer. Scary time.
ReplyDeleteYes, it is scarily dry this spring. The usual vernal pools in the bush are few and far between...we need rain so badly.
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